Sample Lecture Notes – Tort Law
Tort Lecture 2
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Battery: the intentional and direct application of force to another person.
o Direct application of force
§ Any physical contact
§ Does not require physical harm
§ Does not require personal contact (i.e. spitting)
o Direct?
§ Scott v Sheppard, 1773
• Not limited to touching the claimant
• The defendant set in motion a series of action that
amounted to a battery
o Intention
§ Intention is required to contact, not to harm
§ Wilson v Pringle, 1986
• Not necessary that the defendant intended to harm or
injure. Only that the defendant intended to contact.
• The intention is to protect your bodily integrity, which is
compromised by a simple touch.
o Transferred intention – when someone intends to apply force to one
person but misses and applies that force to an unintended person. In this
case the person who receives the application of force has received battery
by transferred intention.
Is all touching battery?
o Tort of battery has a wide definition
§ Distinguish battery from legally unobjectionable conduct
§ Courts attempted to exclude from scope of tort touching which
occurs in everyday situations
Collins v Wilcock, 1984
o Principle – every person’s body is inviolate, the touching of another,
however slight may amount to a battery.
o Exceptions:
§ Reasonable punishment of children (this has changed a result of
article 3 of the ECHR)
§ Lawful exercise of the power of arrest
§ Reasonable force used in self-defense or defense of others
§ Implied consent/physical contact which is generally acceptable in
the ordinary conduct of daily life
• The question is whether the contact has gone beyond the
reasonable exceptions.
Intentional infliction of physical harm by indirect means
o Intentional infliction physical harm?